Two women have been arrested for allegedly assaulting a Wisconsin state legislator.
Samantha Hamer, 26, and Kerida O’Reilly, 33, were charged on Monday with substantial battery as a party to a crime and robbery with use of force as a party to a crime for allegedly attacking state Sen. Tim Carpenter last month, according to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
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The two women were a part of a larger group of protesters who began accosting him for taking a photo of their group.
“I don’t know what happened … all I did was stop and take a picture … and the next thing I’m getting five, six punches, getting kicked in the head,” he said shortly after the attack occurred.
Carpenter, a Democrat, told police that he felt “lightheaded, stunned, and dazed” after the attack, and he was hospitalized.
“Thanks to help from the community, the case detective was able to identify the two persons of interest. Both turned themselves in today,” the Police Department said in its announcement of the arrests.
The protests that day took place shortly after a black activist was arrested. Devonere Johnson was arrested after entering a restaurant in Madison’s Capitol Square area with a megaphone and baseball bat, the report said. Videos of the arrest showed Johnson appearing to resist arrest. At least three officers held him down on the ground.
The demonstrations later became violent as protesters smashed windows near the Capitol and pulled down two statues that stood outside the statehouse. A statue of Col. Hans Christian Heg, an abolitionist who died fighting for the Union during the Civil War, was beheaded and thrown into a lake. Another statue meant as an “allegory of devotion and progress” was also removed from its base.
